Romney camp will ask for retraction on WaPo Bain story

Mitt Romney campaign representatives will meet with The Washington Post today to seek a formal retraction of its June 21 report that Bain Capital invested in firms that specialized in outsourcing American jobs, POLITICO has learned.

The representatives will meet with executive editor Marcus Brauchli and other senior Post staff at 2 p.m. today at the Post's offices in Washington.

The group intends to argue that the Post's allegations against Bain Capital and the firms in question are either incomplete or inaccurate, sources familiar with the meeting say.

Specifically, the group will argue that the Post misinterpreted the SEC filings it examined for its report and failed to adequately account for the support these firms gave to U.S. exports or U.S. businesses through foreign hiring. The campaign raised similar objections to the story prior to its publication.

The group has prepared defenses for each firm mentioned in the Post's article — including Chippac, Corporate Software, GT Bicycle, Modus Media, SMTC Corp., and Stream International — on a case by case basis.

"The Post's editors take all complaints seriously and are always willing to listen to concerns and look into them," Post spokewoman Kris Coratti told POLITICO, when asked about the meeting. She did not provide any further details.

This move is a departure from the the Romney campaign's strategy on the Bain issue so far, which has been largely to avoid engaging Obama's Bain attacks in speeches and campaign ads. Until now, the Romney team's only response to the Post story has been to argue there's a difference between "offshoring" and "outsourcing."